10 Common Mistakes That All Electronics Enthusiasts Make &

How to Avoid Them

The mistakes listed below are made by newbies, veterans, and everyone in between. The order I’ve listed them in
doesn’t reflect their order of importance; it’s important for the electronics enthusiast to avoid all of them.

1. Only working with trainers (like Arduino) and no naked microcontrollers (like the PIC)

I wrote a blog post on this. Things like the Arduino and RPi have helped many school-aged children and non-
engineers alike spark an interest in electronics and programming. They’re great for learning and prototyping
projects, but if you only work with trainers, you’re missing a lot. Yes, it will be harder at first to work directly with a
stand-alone microcontroller, but if you stick with you’ll find it’s worth it. Start with one you may be familiar with:
the ATmega328P, the brains behind the Arduino Uno.

2. Focusing mostly on projects and not learning enough theory

It’s easy to copy someone else’s design and build a working gadget, but if you want to be able to design your own
widgets and understand how the stuff you’ve built works you’ll need to understand some electrical theory. You
likely know about Ohm’s Law already. Take the time to learn about different circuit analysis techniques and more
about the components, too. There are a ton of books, magazines, and online resources (like my blog) that can help
you with this.

3. Not taking safety seriously

Most of know that electricity can be dangerous. Always be sure to exercise the right precautions, especially when
working with AC power (like the 120V in your home) or any high voltage, whether AC or DC. Anything 50V or more
is said to be dangerous, but you probably already know that it’s the current that kills, not the voltage. Be that as it
may, current is proportional to voltage, so keep that in mind. Fires can also result from electricity, even with lower
voltage DC, so be sure your gadgets are safe before putting them to use in your home. Also, be aware that soldering
irons can cause 2nd or even 3rd degree burns. Dropping a hot iron in your lap is the last thing you want to do, which
brings us to our next mistake…

4. Not learning to solder properly

Learning to solder correctly is not that hard, especially with through-hole components. Cold solder joints suck and
can cause you to waste hours trying to figure out why your widget won’t work or only works sometimes. Solder
bridges can do the same or maybe destroy your components all together. Buy a couple of kits and learn to solder
that way. You’ll be glad you did.

Copyright 2017 by Custom Computer Solutions, LLC – all rights reserved.

 5. Buying a low-end soldering iron

A soldering iron is one of the basic tools of the trade. Invest in a decent one with variable temperature control.
These can be found for under $100. I made a video about getting started in electronics where I go over what type of
soldering iron I recommend (among other things).

6. Not learning enough math

This sort of coincides with #2. Basic math skills are essential to designing things that work. You may not need to
master calculus or differential equations, but you should have a decent understanding of algebra and trigonometry.
If you don’t there are plenty of resources available online and in book form to help you get up to snuff. If you are
decent with those two, good at math, or interested in studying higher level math learning things like calculus and
more may not be a bad idea, though not required unless you’re an aspiring engineer.

7. Being rude and condescending to those with less experience and knowledge

No one knows everything. There are things about electronics I don’t know and things you don’t know. But time and
time again I see rude people in online forums flaming others for asking “stupid” questions. No one likes being
condescended to. I remember certain professors when I was studying electrical engineering that were famous for
this. Don’t be like them. There may come a day when you need help and ask what appears to be a “stupid” question
to someone who knows more about that topic. How would you like to be treated?

8. Focusing mostly on theory and not getting your hands dirty

This one is sort of the converse of #2 and is one that I’ve been guilty of myself in the past. Sometimes, things look
good on paper and the simulations go well, but when you build them you find that they don’t work as expected.
Thinking back to my college days, most my engineering classes had labs and/or hands on projects to complete in
addition to the classroom part of the course. There’s a good reason for this. They say experience is the best
teacher. I’m not sure if that’s always true in every case, but with electronics a healthy balance between theory and
practice won’t steer you wrong.

9. Focusing mostly on hardware or software instead of being proficient at both

This one applies to people that work with microcontrollers or trainers like the Arduino, which these days is the
majority of us. If you want to work with these devices, you need to understand software to accomplish the task at
hand and write efficient code. You also need to understand hardware to grasp the MCU architecture and the things
you’ll be connecting to it. There are many books and websites that focus on embedded system design. There are
also many resources that focus on either hardware or software.

10. Not properly documenting projects, code, etc. for later

How many of us have started a project, put in on the back burner for some reason, then returned to it months later
only to be stumped by the code we wrote or the design of the project? Proper documentation includes things like
well-commented, non-obfuscated code; legible schematic diagrams, notes on hardware design and component
selection, and things like oscilloscope screen captures etc. In my college days, we had to write a lab report for every
experiment we did explaining the theory, design, scope screen captures, MATLAB, and SPICE simulation results and
more. Maybe a lab report is an over-kill for your project, but you’ll be glad you documented it well if it breaks down
the road or you return to finish it after a long break.

Copyright 2017 by Custom Computer Solutions, LLC – all rights reserved.